KMT’s legislative majority no help to Ma: opinion poll

By Chris Wang / Staff reporter

More than 60 percent of respondents to a survey published yesterday said the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) majority in the legislature was hindering President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) governance and that KMT lawmakers have been irresponsible.

Asked whether the KMT caucus, which controls more than 60 percent of the 113-member legislature, has been helpful in crafting and implementing Ma’s policies, 60.5 percent of respondents said it was not, with only 23.8 percent of those polled saying the majority had been helping Ma’s governance, the poll by Taiwan Indicator Survey Research found.

A greater percentage of respondents — 67.7 percent — said that KMT lawmakers have not been responsible in monitoring the government’s handling of controversial pension reforms and year-end bonuses for retired public sector workers.

Only one-third of those polled said the Ma administration had made an effort to resolve controversies surrounding the nation’s pension programs and the year-end bonuses, with 49.6 percent saying that Ma has not paid enough attention to these issues.

The survey found that Ma’s approval rating remains low at 18.4 percent, with 70.5 percent of respondents disapproving of his performance and 61.3 percent of respondents saying they found the president untrustworthy.

Former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) was viewed as more trustworthy than Ma, followed by DPP Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and Vice President Wu Den-yih (吳敦義), the survey showed.

Almost half, or 49 percent, of respondents said that Tsai was trustworthy, while 30.5 percent said she was not, while Su was close behind with a credibility rating of 41.1 percent.

Wu lagged far behind with a credibility rating of 20.1 percent, and 62 percent of those polled said they though the vice president was not trustworthy.

Views toward the DPP’s planned protest on Sunday were mixed, with 45.6 percent of respondents saying they supported the demonstration and 41.5 percent saying it is unnecessary.

The poll was conducted on Monday and Tuesday and collected 1,005 valid samples with a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.